It was Akuma Battle #300, according to Alya's tracking on the Ladyblog. 300 battles in and Adrien was still getting brainwashed during some fights. This last akuma wasn't even that good, just a Dark Cupid knock-off; If you got hit by Spade King's playing cards, you were under his control.
Thankfully for Adrien, Ladybug could handle that particular akuma by herself. That didn't mean he could get over the scared look on her face when he had finally snapped out of the trance. He couldn't tell if she was scared because he had been attacking her or because she also realized he was still regularly getting brainwashed, but he figured it didn't matter. He made her scared and knew that look in her eyes would haunt him.
Spade King's battle was after school on Wednesday, but Adrien had been thinking of it ever since. He was thinking about it enough that he was sure he had dissociated when his father rebuked him for missing fencing. He was glad that there wasn't a scheduled patrol on Wednesday nights, he didn't think he could handle seeing Ladybug's face so soon after he let her down… again.
Usually when he felt like this, he could play piano and stop thinking for a while. He tried, he really did, but every note he played sounded shrill, too high pitched, no matter how low the key he played. Every note made him grind his teeth, so much that he thought he would grind the bones right out of his mouth. He ended up grabbing the spare mouth guard that he had for fencing just to stop the gritting of his teeth.
On Thursday morning, he walked into school, still not fully aware of what was going on around him. He walked up the front steps and didn't really notice if there was anyone near him or not, he didn't immediately see his friends, so he went up to their classroom where Alya, Nino, and Marinette were sitting in their seats talking.
"She's so cool," Alya announced excitedly, "can you believe she's real?" Adrien assumed it was another conversation starring Ladybug; normally one of his favorite things, today was just a cause of strife for him. Alya tacked on, "I think Scarabella should be Ladybug's new sidekick." Alya was trying to use her newest secret identity to get under Marinette's skin because she thought it would be funny.
"Ladybug and Chat Noir's sidekick, maybe," Marinette said quietly. Her voice conveyed confidence in her words, even though she wasn't confident about her audience's thoughts.
"She could just replace Chat Noir as Ladybug's sidekick." Adrien's words were quiet, but just as well enunciated as they ever were. He didn't really register that he was the one who had said them. At least, he didn't register that until Marinette looked like she was going to crack her neck with the speed she moved to face him..
"As Ladybug's what?!" Her face looked a moment away from flaming up and she was physically stopping herself from vaulting her desk to fist his shirt collar.
"Ladybug's sidekick," he repeated. He heard an almost distant popping sound that he couldn't identify. It was the popping of Marinette's knuckles. She wasn't planning to fight the love of her life, but she would do what she had to for Chat's honor.
"First of all, he is not her sidekick. They are partners. Second of all, she would never replace Chat." This was the first time he had fully realized that he was having this conversation.
"She never would? Have you seen how many part-time heroes there are? Carapace? Vesperia? Pigella? Purple Tigress? Polymouse? She could have any of them as her partner and they could be just as effective as Ladybug would be with Chat Noir. In fact, they might even be better because none of their powers are literal destruction."
"Oh, yeah," she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "Let's compare the hero who has been in almost every akuma battle with a group of rarely appearing miraculous users. Great idea. It doesn't matter who else is there, what matters is that Ladybug can rely on Chat Noir during the battles. Even when Rena and Carapace got akumatized on Heroes Day a few years back, they won because it was Ladybug and Chat Noir, and they're partners."
"Some partner he is," Adrien responds. "None of the part-time heroes have ever tried to kill her."
"You don't know what you're talking about! He's only ever tried to help her and protect her. It isn't his fault that protecting her from a blast means taking the blast for her. He would never get hit if she just paid more attention to her surroundings. She never wants him to take the hits; He's too important to her."
"You're wrong," he told her, "Why would he matter to her? All he does is flirt, make dumb jokes, get brainwashed by akumas, and generally distract her." Marinette guffawed at his claim.
"Is that what you think? I expected more of you, Adrien. Chat Noir is amazing. He's a quick thinker, he would need to be one in order to come up with those 'dumb' jokes you said he makes. He's sweet, not just to Ladybug, but to everyone he comes in contact with. Have you ever seen him interact with victims after they've been de-akumatized? He only gets 'brainwashed' because Ladybug is too slow and single minded to realize that she is getting attacked by an akuma all the time on the battlefield. He doesn't distract her more than she needs him to in order to stay calm in high stress situations."
"Chat Noir is the high-stress situation," he responded, "did you not see the fight yesterday? The scared look in her eyes when he was under the akuma's influence?"
"Scared? If Nino punched you in the face right now, are you trying to tell me you wouldn't be scared about what would cause him to do that, knowing how totally out of character it would be for him? You can be scared for someone's well-being without being scared of someone."
She quietly huffed, folding her arms in a way that showed her distaste for Adrien's interpretation of her alter ego's expression. Adrien's face softened for the first time in what felt like weeks but had been less than a day.
"You're probably right, Mari," he said quietly. He was partially able to understand her point, but he was also tired of arguing with her. After a short while, it felt like arguing with her was just a roundabout way of making Marinette stroke his ego. "If Ladybug thinks he's even half as important as you do, he's one lucky guy." With that, Mme. Bustier walked in to start class, so Adrien turned to face the front for the lesson. Marinette's words bounced around Adrien's head for the rest of the day.
Adrien had a photoshoot that day in the Champ de Mars. As Adrien, he didn't get to come to this area often and he was slightly surprised to see how many shops around the base of the Eiffel Tower were selling touristy knick knacks. Most sellers had little Eiffel Tower keychains, a few 'Paris' baseball caps, and fanny packs. A few sellers had little toy cars, and robotic pets. He saw one seller who had different wares than the rest, this one had Ladybug and Chat Noir merch.
During his 15-minute break from set, he ran over to that seller. He had a few pieces of jewelry themed around Chat Noir. Adrien saw a necklace. It was a black chain with a pendant. The black pendant had his symbol. The man running the store called to him across the empty shop.
"That's one of my best sellers. People really love him." Adrien was certain this man didn't know how much he needed to hear that. Adrien nodded and picked up the jewelry box from the shelf. He saw that there was a small card where he could write his own message. He brought it to the cash till and paid for the necklace.
"Do you happen to have a pen?" Adrien's joy was unbridled when he decided what he wanted to write on the card. The man behind the till held out a black pen and Adrien wrote his message as clearly as he could. He closed the box and handed the pen back to the man. "Merci, Monsieur." He gave the man a short, polite nod of acknowledgement before he ran back to the shoot. He had just enough time to place the box into his bag before Vincent was ready to continue the shoot.
The next day, he walked into school in a much better mood. For the fourth time since he got out of the car, he checked his pocket for the box. His heart raced in his chest when he saw the black pigtails he'd been looking for. The perfect color to match the chain of the necklace in his pocket. He debated internally if it would be better to give it to her in the courtyard or if she would be embarrassed and it would be better if he waited to give it to her in the classroom. He unconsciously strode up to her. It didn't immediately sound like anyone was talking to her, so he took his chance.
"I got you something." The word vomit began. "I was at a photoshoot yesterday and I saw it and it reminded me of you." He took the box out of his pocket and held it out to her. Marinette, despite her stupor, held out her hand to receive whatever it was. He placed the box into her palm and opened it. "You see, it's Chat Noir themed. You seemed like a big fan of his yesterday, but I've never seen you wear any of his merch before. Not that I ever saw any of his merch before yesterday, but that's not the point. I thought you might like this necklace, but I understand if you wouldn't want it. Sorry, jewelry is probably a weird present-" Adrien stopped talking when he felt one of Marinette's hands land on top of his.
"I love it, Adrien. Thank you." She brought the necklace closer to her face to look at the little card. "To Chat Noir's most furvent suppurrter," she read off the card. He saw her crack a smile at the cat puns. She delicately removed the necklace and slightly turned to Alya. "Will you help me put it on?"
"I'd love to," Adrien answered, not noticing that Marinette had tried to ask Alya. He reached out a hand to accept it and she momentarily froze. Alya patted Marinette's back to support her. Marinette held the necklace out to hand it to Adrien and he took the chain. He undid the clasp and stepped behind her, he lowered the pendant in front of her and she was overcome with the scent of Adrien: The Fragrance and a hint of something… else. She pushed her pigtails toward the front to make sure they would be out of his way, and he clasped the necklace easily.
He stepped back around her to look at how the pendant fell. It rested in a nice spot, not too long that it fell to her chest, but long enough that she could look down and see it without struggling for an angle. It rested at about 5 cm from the base of her neck. *It's lovely," both of them said at the same time. His eyes moved from looking at the pendant back to her face where he could see just how bright her cheeks had become during the exchange.
"Thank you for helping me." She put the box into the pocket of her school bag. "We should get to class." He nodded and the quartet went to their classroom.
During every spare minute he had that day, Adrien would turn to talk with Alya and Marinette so that he could have more chances to look at her wearing the necklace. A few times, he caught her staring at it wistfully with a dreamy expression on her face. He assumed that the dreamy expression was from her thinking about Chat Noir. He mentally congratulated himself on how well he'd done choosing a gift for his good friend.
Meanwhile, Marinette found herself regularly looking at the necklace with the only thing on her mind being 'Adrien thought of me.' Her heart felt full everytime she thought about it and the little note that he'd given her with it.
That weekend, she didn't even consider taking off the necklace. There was an akuma attack on Saturday and Marinette was very aware during the fight that she was wearing a piece of his merch under her transformation. She also found herself wondering if Chat ever wore Ladybug merch in his civilian form. She figured it would be better not to bring it up in case he asked her the same question because she didn't think she would be able to stop herself from telling him that her crush got Chat Noir merch for her.
That particular akuma battle was easy for the heroes. Chat Noir didn't even have to use his cataclysm. Ladybug fondly ruffled the top of his hair, acting as though she could mess it up more than it already was. He caught her hand and kissed the back of it. "Until we meet again, my lady." She waved to the crowd before she departed.
Chat stayed behind to speak with the akumatized victim. 'I guess Marinette was right about Chat's willingness to comfort the victim,' Adrien found himself thinking while he was approaching. They spoke for a while to try to get the victim calmed down. Eventually, her family showed up and she got up to leave with them. Chat Noir gave her a two-fingered salute when she left, and he used his baton to vault himself on top of a nearby building.
He considered using the time he still had to visit Marinette, but he was worried it would be suspicious for Chat Noir to visit her the day after Adrien had given her the necklace. He passed by her building on the way home with the thought that if she was on the balcony, he would stop but if she wasn't, he wouldn't. He didn't see her on the balcony, so he resigned to just going back to his room.
On Monday, Marinette was still wearing the necklace. As soon as Adrien arrived in the courtyard, she gestured excitedly for him to come over to her. Her smile was bigger than he had seen on her in a long while. He could see the necklace contrasted against the white of her shirt.
"I have great news!" She could barely keep herself from squeaking from her excitement. "I need all three of you to come with me." Alya and Nino nodded in confirmation.
"Lead the way!" Marinette's enthusiasm was contagious to him. She led the three of them through the locker area to a custodial closet. She was mostly excited to show Adrien, but she really didn't want to just seem like she was trying to get him alone in a closet with her. Her nerves would have never been able to handle something like that. The door was unlocked, so she opened it and motioned for her friends to go in.
It was surprisingly spacious, but Marinette didn't turn on the lights. That, in itself, was a little nerve-wracking for her friends. She closed the door behind her and in the darkened room, they could faintly see Marinette moving. She moved her hand from off of the pendant and the pawprint was very clear in the room.
"It glows-in-the-dark!" Marinette was practically bouncing with excitement. "It's seriously like the coolest thing I own. I love it so much." Alya rushed to her best friend's side to take a closer look at the necklace.
"This is so cool. Where did you say you got this, Sunshine?" She looked up to where she assumed Adrien was standing, but in the darkness of the closet, she couldn't be sure of where exactly he was. "I think a glow-in-the-dark Carapace necklace would be awesome." Adrien didn't want to tell her. He wasn't sure why he didn't want to tell her, but he didn't. He wanted to keep the store a secret just for himself. What if Alya went for a Carapace necklace but ended up getting more Chat Noir gear for Marinette. For some reason, that idea felt wrong to him.
"I don't know, exactly. It was a little shop over by the Eiffel Tower. There are a ton of them, though. I don't know if I'll be able to find it again." He moved slowly to rub the back of his neck, knowing that as a civilian he couldn't see where his friends were in the dark.
"Hey, should we get out of this closet," Nino suggested. He thought the necklace was cool, but he felt kind of weird about standing in a dark closet with all three of his closest friends instead of just his girlfriend. "I don't think any of us need more late marks." The others agreed with the sentiment and the four of them left the closet and went to class.
On Wednesday of that week, Adrien went to a fabric store with Nino and Alya. Marinette had agreed to make a dress for Alya for her anniversary dinner with Nino, but Alya needed to choose the color. She immediately went to the section of the store that had silks and fingered through the oranges. Neither Alya nor Nino noticed that Adrien had gotten distracted and wandered off.
He saw a rack of ribbons and couldn't help himself. One dark ribbon caught his eye more than the rest. There was one that was about a centimeter thick with a solid black base. It had Chat Noir paw prints on it, each of which were about a centimeter big with a gap of about 1 cm between each paw print.. He reached a hand up to touch the ribbon and couldn't help himself. He picked it up and brought it to the nearby cashier.
"Can I have 2 20 cm lengths of this ribbon?" His smile was big and bright.
"Of course, Monsieur. Is there anything else that I can do for you?"
"Do you have any fabrics that glow in the dark?" The cashier was visibly thinking about if there were any of those fabrics in the store. After she cut the pieces of ribbon and put them into a bag for him, she walked him over to the 'Seasonal' section. She noted a few of the Halloween fabrics that were glow in the dark and he bit his thumb looking between a few of them. They were all patterned and he didn't think that she would like to use them as much as she would probably prefer more plain fabrics.
"Thank you," he said to the cashier that had led him there.
He looked around the store from where he was standing and something else caught his eye. He saw a solid black fabric in the 'Heroes' section and that made him raise an eyebrow. He couldn't help himself and wandered closer to the fabric that had caught his eye. At first glance, it was a solid black, cotton fabric, but when you got closer, you could see that there were faint shapes of rings, batons, and masks built into the fabric. Everything was black, but they were slightly different shades. The base was jet black while the shapes were black with an almost green tinge to them.
He bought a few yards, hopeful that Marinette could find something interesting to do with the fabric, maybe a shirt, or a bag, or something. He didn't know. He's not a designer. He paid for the fabric and ribbons just in time to meet Alya and Nino at the front of the store.
"Should we head over to Mari's," Alya suggested, "I'd really like to drop off this fabric as soon as possible, then maybe we can all go try to find that Superhero shop over by the Eiffel Tower." She gave Nino's hand a gentle squeeze and he nodded. The three walked down the sidewalk in the direction of the Dupain-Cheng Boulangerie Patisserie.
When they arrived, Tom and Sabine immediately shooed the three of them upstairs to Marinette's room. Her trap door was unlocked so Alya went in first. When she saw that Marinette was just sketching at her desk, she motioned for the boys to follow her up. She looked over Marinette's shoulder at the sketchbook where she had been working on the dress she had been working on for Alya.
"Fabric delivery," Alya called out, snapping Marinette out of her work-mode. Marinette slightly jumped, kicking off of her desk and starting to topple her rolling chair. Thankfully, Adrien was able to get over to her fast enough to save her from falling over completely. She blushed lightly when she saw who had caught her.
"Thank you," she said with a bright smile. She stood up from where she had been sitting and turned to face her friends. "What did you bring to sacrifice to me?" Alya opened her bag, revealing a shimmery, almost metallic looking orange color that gave Marinette an extra burst of inspiration. Marinette touched the fabric and made some notes in the margin of the page she had been working on. "It's gorgeous, Al. I can't wait to use it on your dress."
"I also brought a sacrifice," Adrien said quietly, holding out his own bag to Marinette.
"Great," she responded. "What do you need me to make and how fast do you need it?" She used one finger to gently pry the bag open.
"Oh. No. I just got some fabric for you. I thought you might like it, but you weren't there, so I just got some for you. Not a lot, but I don't know. You're creative, so I figured you could do something fun or interesting with it." He shoved the bag fully into her hands and she opened the bag fully.
She reached in and picked up an edge of the fabric he'd brought. The texture was soft and she immediately knew what she wanted to do with it. "There's also a smaller bag in the bottom." She removed the fabric he'd gotten for her and saw the smaller, paper bag. She opened it also, revealing the ribbons within. "You always have pigtails, so I thought maybe you'd like ribbons for them. At least, once in a while."
Adrien knew it could be overwhelming to just be talked at like he had been doing, but he couldn't help himself, even though he had been trying. She placed a hand gently on his forearm. "I love them. Help me put them on?" After last time when he jumped in to help when she had asked Alya, Marinette figured Adrien would want to help her again.
Adrien tied one ribbon onto her left pigtail while she tied the ribbon onto her right. When they were both secured with little bows, she bobbed her head in both directions a few times while she admired the ribbons out of the corners of her eyes. She couldn't see them well, but she had a mirror in the corner she could use to look at them. Marinette gave him a grateful hug. "I love them," she repeated, "they're perfect. Plus, they match my new necklace."
Adrien couldn't help but smile at how absolutely giddy Marinette was about the gifts. Before he stepped back from her, he noticed something about her necklace. The chain had moved and the clasp was now at the front. Without thinking, he brought both hands up, one grabbed the pendant and one grabbed the clasp. He guided the clasp to the back of her neck before he fully realized what he had been doing. When he did, they both blushed and Adrien brought his hands back to his sides as quickly as he could.
"Sorry," he said with a bright blush on his face.
"It's fine," she responded. "I appreciate you fixing it." Her face was slightly pinker than it had been a moment ago, but not nearly as much as Adrien's. "We were wanting to go see if we could find that shop by the Eiffel Tower, right?" The question was directed to the full group, not just Adrien.
"Hell yeah," Alya exclaimed, "let's go!" The four of them left Marinette's room and headed toward the Champ de Mars. Alya and Nino walked hand-in-hand and Adrien walked with his hands in his pockets to quiet his sudden want to hold Marinette's. Holding Marinette's hand wasn't something he had ever really thought about before, but suddenly, he couldn't think about anything else.
When they got close to the Champ de Mars, Adrien started looking around trying to find the shop that he had gone to last week. He saw most of the same shops as he had seen last week, but he couldn't find the one with Superhero gear.
"Where's the store, Sunshine," Alya asked, just as excited about the store as she had been for almost a week. She was looking into almost every store that they walked past, seeing mostly sweatshirts, mini versions of the Eiffel Tower, and bags that tourists would buy.
Adrien shrugged. "I don't see it, but I'm willing to retrace my steps from the shoot and maybe we can find it again." He led the three others in the direction of the spot where he knew most of the pictures were taken last week.
They looked around in all directions when he got to the spot he had seen the previous week, but he didn't see the same shop he'd gone to the week before. He had, however, seen a singular store that had a Ladybug balloon out front. He pointed to it. "How about we try that shop," he suggested and Alya's face broke into a large grin. She practically sprinted to the store, dragging Nino behind her.
Marinette looked around the store, surprised to see how much more Ladybug gear there was than the other heroes combined. The others hardly noticed as Alya immediately saw a Carapace bracelet and Nino practically sprinted to a Rena Rouge baseball cap. The couple held up their items to one another in order to show off what they had found. The two were engrossed in their own conversation.
Marinette looked at the Chat Noir items that were in the store. She looked at a few things and Adrien pretended to look at Ladybug themed items while he watched Marinette browse out of the corner of his eye. He noticed when she took an extra few seconds to look at a pair of slippers, a pair of earrings, and a few keychains that made her smile.
He decided he wouldn't get anything else for her that day, but he made a mental note of the things that she liked in order to come back to get them for her next time he wanted to get one for her. She stopped by the rest of the necklaces that matched the one she was wearing and didn't see anything that noted that they were supposed to glow in the dark.
She picked up one and placed it into a shadow to just admire the glow, but it didn't. She was a little surprised and picked up a different one to run the same test. The second one didn't glow either. With each of the tests, her face grew more and more confused. After she had looked through 5, Adrien decided it was worth it to ask what was causing the look on her face.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing?" Her answer sounded more like a question than she meant for it to. "They're not glowing. I don't know why this one does." She gripped her own necklace like she was scared it was suddenly going to change just because it was different than the rest. Adrien's smile widened a little bit more. "I guess this one is just special," he told her, "like you." Without a second thought, his Chat Noir personality slipped out, "it matches the fact that you light up my life." He felt himself wince a little bit from embarrassment at his own comment.
She giggled at his comment, "thank you, again. I really do love it. And the fact that mine glows in the dark when these other ones don't just makes it mean that much more to me." Marinette looked right into Adrien's eyes and he had to refocus his attention in order to make sure he was still breathing.
Nino came up behind Adrien suddenly, practically slamming a hand on his back to get his attention. "Did you guys choose anything?" Alya was holding a plain white plastic bag that had a faint green tint from how much her bag was filled with Carapace merch and Nino's had an orange tint from all of the Rena Rouge gear.
"I don't need anything else right now," Marinette told them, "but I'm really glad to know that this place exists for next time I do want some hero gear."
